The conservative philosophy is that government should stay out of the way and let free enterprise basically have free rein. The conservatives allege that the business community will look out for our best interests in a paternalistic "pat on the head" kind of way.
However, this philosophy has been proven time and time again to be bad for the public. A recent article in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette stated that businesses are balking on voluntary nutrional guidelines that would encourage food makers to reduce salt, added sugars and fats in foods targeted toward children. If their products did not meet certain standards, the foodmakers who follow the guidelines would refrain from advertising them to children. Some heavy hitters in the media as well as the chamber of commerce are using scare tactics such as job loss to back the government off. Nevermind that the childhood obesity rate in this country --one in three kids is obese or overweight -- is, well, obscene. Big business would rather reel in their lucrative audience and their money rather than do the right thing to curb childhood obesity. So is this really how we want our country to be run? By big corporations whose only regard is for the bottom line?
I guess this article outraged me because businesses won't, in my opinion, do the right thing when it comes time to choose health or safety over their bottom line. They will choose the bottom line every time because their business is to make money for themselves and their shareholders.
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